Sign
by 9r7g5h
Summary: She refused to sign the treaty, mainly because of her.


**AN:** I know this goes against canon, but I like the idea of Marceline being the last of the Vampires. Mainly because our main lady was a badass and killed them off. :D But overall, I had no clue where this fic was going, so yeah. Sorry about that. It's a bit woobly, but hopefully you guys still like it!

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Adventure Time. Cartoon Network does.

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><p>"You still haven't signed that peace treaty, Marceline."<p>

"Yeah, just come right on in," Marceline grumbled as the pink princess pushed the door to the tree house shut behind her, glare already stuck on her face as her hands found her hips. At least, Marceline quickly decided to be grateful about, the ruler of the Candy Kingdom had waited until sunset to come visit her again, when Marceline, while not fully awake, would at least not be completely asleep either.

She still pulled the blankets over her head and grumbled, trying to ignore her friend and the stack of rotting paper that had been sitting on her table untouched for the last ten years.

She couldn't curse the stack too much, though; it was the entire reason the bubblegum monarch had first knocked on the door to her treehouse, and the reason why she'd been getting at least weekly visits for all this time.

She'd laughed, of course, when Bubblegum had first showed up exactly at midnight, clad in what she could have only guessed would be proper treaty discussion attire, though Marceline had been quick to let her know she looked like a dead marshmallow. The Princess, hearing about the recent trouble vampires had been causing in the nearby newly forming kingdoms, had quickly decided that the best route to ensure safety for her people was to get a signed agreement from their queen.

Which had only made Marceline laugh harder, for by the time Bubblegum had come to ask the two-hundred and sixty-three year old for her signature, Marceline had been the only vamp left for almost twenty years.

Not, of course, something Marceline had told the princess; since she'd been the one causing the talked about trouble, it helped to have others think that more than one vampire still walked the land of Ooo, and that Marceline had some sort of control over them. A fact that she was more than willing to use to her advantage, pretending to care about the supposed damage her subjects had caused while Princess Bubblegum started to lay out the terms of their treaty for discussion.

Once, shortly after the Mushroom Wars had killed off almost everything else, leaving only the supernatural beings behind to fix the mess the mortals had made, there'd numbered almost a thousand vamps, give or take a few dozen at any given time. But, being the idiots that they all were, instead of spreading across the now almost completely uninhabited planet, they had all settled in what would eventually become Ooo, deadly scuffles over overlapping territories that neither party knew they were sharing quickly leading to her adopted species' decline. She'd been lucky, in a way; her maker hadn't turned her until there were only a few dozen left, all of them old and weary enough of fighting to finally realize they were almost extinct and willing to make peace between themselves so they wouldn't have to keep watching their backs every moment of the day.

Marceline had been quick to learn that half-demon vamps beat full blooded previous mortals any day, and although she hadn't killed them all right out-like she had with the vamp that had turned her after learning all she could from the old man-the handful of fangs that had come from the few she let live that were stashed under her bed were almost as good as bodies to let her know they had starved.

A more accurate title, she had almost told Bubblegum when the monarch had said her name, would have been Queen of the Undead, thus lumping her father's minions (which she had a great deal of, almost total, control over) and all the other species she had beaten into accepting her rule under the proper umbrella that was her.

But Marceline the Vampire Queen almost rhymed, and so though she was the last one and she had no undead children that she knew of running around, it stuck.

Not that Bonnibel, which Marceline quickly discovered as the princess' real name, knew any of that. She had coming hoping for a permanent peace treaty between the Candy People and the Undead (as if a sheet of scribbles was going to keep _her _from having her fun), and for a few weeks Marceline humored her, arguing and hashing and rehashing details that would bind the princess to rules the queen would break anytime she wanted, all while still getting the rewards.

No flying over the Candy Kingdom at night (which she then started doing each weekend) in return for all the red she could drink (monthly baskets of apples, cherries, and some little gumdrops that started her to thinking about the logistics of cannibalistic candy delivered to her door); monthly meetings to keep Bubblegum updated on how her 'people' were accepting the new restrictions (and seeing as how most of them were dead, those went quickly and painlessly) in return for guaranteed safe passage to and from any boarder of the Candy Kingdom (not that she needed it; even at ninety-seven she'd been a badass, and an extra hundred and forty years had only made her more so); the list and the game had gone on and on until her side-the winning one-was more than happy and PB was just glad no one would be eaten that night.

_Months _spent toiling over those tomes and scrolls, covering every kind of dispute Marceline could come up with-half of them just to test the girl in front of her, the other half because she was actually curious as to what the Princess might do if they arose-and over a hundred copies torn and written and destroyed and recreated, all to get the perfect set up.

Which Marceline had been refusing to sign for the past ten years.

"You haven't even been keeping the documents in good condition," Bubblegum grumbled as she stomped over to the table, covering the lower half of her face with her sleeve as dust poofed into the air as she touched the papers, their dry crinkling only making her frown even more. "I'm surprised that you can even read this anymore."

"Simon taught me to read just find," Marceline huffed sleepily as she tried to hide under her covers, a kind lie she threw in for the old man's sake.

Although he had tried, quite hard, the end of the world was no time to teach a little girl how to read and write and recognize her own name without it being spoken. Much of what she could do she had learned herself, going off the basics that her old friend had had given her (and perhaps a magic tool from her father once or twice). Either way, she could read.

She even liked reading. She just couldn't read _this. _

"It's too boring to read anyway," Marceline yawned, poking a tongue out at the Princess before flopping her had back onto the pillow, trying to forget her companion was even there in favor of sleep. "No pictures."

"Marceline, please," Bubblegum sighed, exasperated. "My people need this treaty to feel safe. Why can't you just sign it?" She didn't look it, but Marceline could tell that the Princess was just _fuming _on the inside; she'd have to remember to be wary in the future, for Bonnie was more than willing to hold a grudge.

Especially one that had been going on for a decade.

"'Cause I don't wanna," was all the reply Marceline gave, waving her hand dismissively at the princess. It was way too early to think about things like this, and with no gig for the next few nights, she could finally do something fun. And worrying about a treaty that's ten years old wasn't going to change anything.

Catching the look in Bonnie's eyes, though, Marceline finally cave, flicking her fingers at the document that was so far gone. "Brink me a new copy, and I'll read through it and give it my vamp queen seal of approval. Got that?"

She didn't get an answer, and Marceline wasn't surprised to fully open her eyes and find herself alone, Bubblegum already gone to fulfill the new requirement Marceline had laid out for her.

She wasn't surprised, because she honestly couldn't care. Bubblegum would be back at a descent hour, long after the sun had set, and she'd have a full, newly written document to sign the moment the princess came in the doors.

Meaning, of course, Marceline would never even look at the papers and instead drop them onto her table with a promise to do them later.

Because it'd been document that had kept Bubblegum coming back for the last ten years, and Marceline wasn't about to do something as simple as signing her name if it mean not seeing her friend.


End file.
